Completed: withdrawal of access to the legacy version of RefWorks

Head of Discovery and Digital Futures

AUTHENTICATED ACCESS TO the legacy version of RefWorks (v2) is no longer available to staff and students at Nottingham Trent University, following the removal of NTU from the drop-down list of Shibboleth sites on the legacy platform.

This means that LLR is now only supporting the current (and far superior) version of RefWorks (v3).

This withdrawal process has taken far longer than intended due to delays by ProQuest in completing the necessary technical work.

Since the launch of RefWorks v3, LLR had been supporting both the new and the legacy versions, to allow sufficient time for users of the legacy version to complete existing research activities without needing to migrate mid-project.

Library support for both versions had been in place for several years. Throughout that time new staff and students had been encouraged by the library to create accounts in RefWorks v3, and the LTT has provided training exclusively for the much-improved new version.

However, a minority of existing v2 users had continued to regularly log in to the legacy version of RefWorks, and a small number of new v2 accounts had been created.

The library has contacted all v2 RefWorks users that have been active on the platform in the past twelve months, offering support and guidance about how to migrate to RefWorks v3. Many have completed the migration to the new platform following this advice.

If any staff member or student contacts the library to report that they need access to references held in their legacy RefWorks account, LLR can – even now – assist them with the migration process. In any such cases, a Dynamics ticket should be raised for the attention of the ATS team, with details of the individual concerned.

ProQuest will decommission the legacy version of RefWorks entirely on 30 June 2023.

New resource: OverDrive

Head of Discovery and Digital Futures

ACCESS TO A growing collection of eBook, audiobook and magazine content is now available to Nottingham Trent University students and staff through the OverDrive platform.

Rather than traditional academic disciplines, materials made available via OverDrive instead focus on well-being, self-help and resilience, and leisure and recreational reading. The Magazine Collection, to which LLR has subscribed, additionally provides access to full electronic versions of thousands of newsstand titles, grouped into themes such as: Celebrity; Entertainment; Cooking & Food; Home & Garden and Politics and Current Affairs.

Accessing OverDrive content

Access to OverDrive materials is through the OverDrive web site and also through the Libby app (available for Android and iOS devices).

Authentication to OverDrive content is by university username and password. NTU staff and students need to register an OverDrive ‘library card’ which then entitles them to ‘borrow’ eBooks and audiobooks from the platform (up to 30 at any one time, for an initial seven day loan period). Once registered, the loaning of magazine issues is unlimited.

Because the way that OverDrive provisions electronic material is different to the normal academic publisher model, LLR is providing an illustrated walkthrough guide to: how to register an OverDrive ‘library card’; how to loan, renew and return items; and how to place holds, through both the OverDrive web site and Libby app.

Discovering OverDrive content

New entries for the main OverDrive platform and for the OverDrive Magazine Collection have been added to the Find Databases service.

Individual titles from LLR’s OverDrive subscription are also discoverable through Library OneSearch and Library OneSearch Pro, including:

New content purchased by LLR will also be immediately discoverable on both the OverDrive platform and through the Libby app.

New resource: Bibliography of British and Irish History Online

Lee Houghton - Resource Applications and Discovery Team Manager

A NEW LISTING for the Bibliography of British and Irish History Online has been added to the Find Databases service.

This resource provides bibliographic data on historical writing dealing with the British Isles, and with the British empire and commonwealth and is described as follows:

As well as providing details of publications, the bibliography offers links to online catalogues to help you find the items that it lists in research libraries in Britain and Ireland. It also provides links to online text where available. The bibliography is a guide to the work of historians – it does not contain original sources, unless they have been edited and republished by historians (except for a selection of key sources published before 1901). The bibliography lists books, articles in books and articles in journals. Some 800 journals and series are regularly checked.

Access to the resource is by university username and password.

Box of Broadcasts – scheduled maintenance – Friday 27 January 2023

Jill Walker - Applications & Technical Services Team

A scheduled system maintenance period for the Box of Broadcasts (BoB) platform will begin Friday 27 January 2023 at 07:00. The provider advises that the service should be considered ‘at risk’ during this time.

New resource: Archive of the British Association for the Advancement of Science

Head of Discovery and Digital Futures
Archive of the British Association for the Advancement of Science

A NEW LISTING for the Archive of the British Association for the Advancement of Science has been added to the Find Databases service.

Materials in the collection cover the period 1830s to the 1970s, and the archive is described as follows:

The archive of the British Association for the Advancement of Science (BAAS) and connected collections from UK universities. The archive covers the subject areas of astronomy, biology, technology, industrial design, chemistry, engineering, mathematics, agriculture, meteorology, physics, history of science and STEM, and government grants for scientific research. It brings together administrative records, correspondence, illustrations, manuscripts, photographs, prototypes, clippings, personal papers and grey literature.

Access to the resource is by university username and password.

The collections is licenced for use by UK HEIs through an agreement with JISC which currently concludes on 31 December 2031.

Box of Broadcasts – scheduled maintenance – Thursday 26 January 2023

Jill Walker - Applications & Technical Services Team

A scheduled system maintenance period for the Box of Broadcasts (BoB) platform will begin Thursday 26 January 2023 at 07:00. The provider advises that the service should be considered ‘at risk’ during this time.

New resource: Subculture Archives

Head of Discovery and Digital Futures
Detail from a collage of photographs, flyers and tickets compiled from the Subculture Archives

ACCESS TO THE Subculture Archives is now available through a new listing in the library’s Find Databases service.

The resource is described as follows:

A multimedia archive of primary sources exploring 100 years of youth culture through the scenes, styles, sounds and signifiers of different youth movements. The Subculture Archives contains images and photographs; recorded and transcribed oral histories, podcasts and playlists; flyers and ephemera; and many examples of fashion, graphic design and printed publications. Drawing on the work of The Subcultures Network of academic researchers, the archive also includes lectures, articles, videos and other research materials.

Authenticated access to the resource is by university username and password.

The resource appears as a ‘Recommended Database’ in Library OneSearch and Library OneSearch Pro when running searches for terms such as ‘counterculture’, ‘subculture’, ‘youth culture’, ‘punk’, ‘hippy’, ‘acid house’ and other related terms.

A subscription to the Subcultures Archives has been paid for by the Nottingham School of Art & Design. The first subscription year runs until 17 January 2024.

Withdrawn resource: Galaxy: Business and Commerce

Jill Walker - Applications & Technical Services Team
Snapshot of the archived galaxy web page.

DUE TO THE winding-up of the free-to-access web directory, the entry for the Galaxy: Business and Commerce web site has been withdrawn from the Find Databases service.

A legacy snapshot of the site remains available through the auspices of the Wayback Machine.

LS:N Global currently unavailable – resolved

Jill Walker - Applications & Technical Services Team

LS:N homepage with Login text

The login issues to LS:N Global have now been fixed by the LSN:Global technical team.

The NTU membership is being recognised again and access restored.

Access is direct from on-campus and by University username and password off-campus.

LS:N apologise for the disruption this has caused.

New resource: The Literary Encyclopedia

Head of Discovery and Digital Futures
The Literary Encyclopedia logo

A NEW LISTING for The Literary Encyclopedia has been added to the Find Databases service.

The resource was previous only discoverable as an ejournal. In its new database listing, the encyclopedia is described as follows:

The Literary Encyclopedia is a wide-ranging reference work focused on literary and cultural history. The encyclopedia includes biographies of major and minor writers; scholarly descriptions of these authors’ texts; and reflective and analytical essays on literary, cultural and historical matters. It aims to cover the full breath of world literature including English, American, German, Russian, Italian, French, and Classical literatures, and a growing body of material covering Hispanic, Japanese, Canadian, East European and various postcolonial literatures.

Access to the resource is by university username and password, on-campus and off-campus.

Off-campus login issues affecting WGSN – Resolved

Jill Walker - Applications & Technical Services Team
WGSN user interface

The recent off-campus log in issues to WGSN have now been resolved.

Both on and off-campus access options are available again when using the Find Databases page links.

https://llr.ntu.ac.uk/dbaz/dbDetail.php?dbID=254

WGSN apologise for any disruption this outage may have caused.

LS:N Global currently unavailable

Jill Walker - Applications & Technical Services Team

LS:N homepage with Login text

The LS:N global platform, which is paid for by the School of Art & Design, and available through the library’s Find Databases platform, is currently unavailable both on and off campus.

Attempts to access content will prompt for a membership login.

The School of Art and Design contact is working with LS:N to try and resolve this issuehe recent access issues for LS:N global platform have now been resolved and NTU’s membership is being recognised again.